Answering the Call
by NShadows
Summary: How at least one student felt when she heard the call to arms.


I'm expanding on the PotterWatch, sorry, Lee.

JK ROWLING owns Harry Potter, we just all love him.

Major spoilers for the end of Deathly Hallows, please don't read unless you've at least gotten to the epilogue. And if you've gotten to the epilogue and not read it, why are you reading fanfic??? GO READ THE EPILOGUE!!!!!!

Please review!!!!

Answering the Call

I listened to Lee Jordan's voice, and all his guests on PotterWatch as though they were all the news I could get.

Of course, I guess they were, weren't they?

So, I kept my channel tuned to listen for them, even on the nights they wouldn't be on. Maybe it was intuition.

I was never a member of the original Dumbledore's Army. I was one that though I loved Harry Potter from a distance, I didn't want to believe Voldemort was back. The idea was...wrong.

I learned the error of my ways though, the day Ginny Weasley ripped me a new one. She was a year younger than me, but man does she have a mouth!

So you'd better believe I signed up the second time.

I'll never forget it. My mum didn't want me to go back to school, she'd lived through Voldemort the first time. My father insisted I go back because I'd begged him to help me. They had a row, with my mum saying he didn't understand because of course, he's a Muggle.

Finally though, she let me go. I stood on a considerably less crowded platform waiting for the Hogwarts Express. When I got to school...well...

Snape became headmaster, and the school was locked down. It was worse than Umbridge, made her look like a bleeding angel actually.

Then the signs began appearing. 'Join Dumbledore's Army!' 'Fight Voldemort!' 'Remember Dumbledore!'

I know who to go to. Straight to Ginny I went. She hadn't forgotten that I'd not believed before, you could see it in her eyes. But she didn't rub my face in it. When I signed on, she handed me a coin and gave me a smile, and said "Welcome to the Fight."

Oh, the anarchy we created, the chaos we caused. Never have I been so proud to break the rules. You'd be surprised at how many teachers knew EXACTLY what was happening and never said a word. Once, though, I even thought Snape had caught me painting a wall sign, but he just kept on going, never even glanced at me. Prat.

Then, one day my mother appeared, and pulled me from school, I barely had time to tell anyone what was happening. It was Luna I caught in the halls, saying as quickly as I could, "Luna, my mum's taking me out of school!"

Luna looked at me in that way she has, you know, the look where you wonder if she heard you, and then she smiled. "Keep your happy thoughts."

So home I went,and kept my channel tuned to listen for them, even on the nights they wouldn't be on. Maybe it was intuition. My parents listened in with me, though it gave my mum all sorts of frights. My dad though, he listened like he thought it might make a difference. Pity he was a Muggle, he'd have been a Gryffindor.

Always there'd be a bit of static before they came on, part of them trying to keep from being traced, I suppose. This night though, as I sat reading the lies of the Daily Prophet, there was a loud burst of static. Startled I sat up, as did my father and mother, though Mum looked only half-awake.

Not even a moment later, Lee's voice came across, frantic and yet, oddly calm. "If you can hear me, Hogwarts is about to be under attack!. Harry Potter is here, and Voldemort is coming for him! He needs our help, all of us! If you can hear me, and you have any loyalty in you to your friends, to Hogwarts, or hell, if you want to see tomorrow, then you better get here now! Come through the Hog's Head! I don't know how long you have, so hurry! Repeating, Harry Potter has returned to Hogwarts and Voldemort's on the way! This is it, people! This is the time to fight!"

I think my mother must have been gasping or something, hell, she might have been choking, but I was already running to my room. In two seconds flat I had grabbed my trunk and thrown it open, pulling my clothes out, searching.

"What is it?" My dad had followed me to my room.

I found it, it had burned my newest jumper My DA coin, pulsing hot.

I looked at my dad. "I'm going." I grabbed my wand and pushed past him, headed for the door.

"Wait! No!" My mother was moving, grabbing her own wand, trying to block my path. "You don't know what's going to happen! You could die!"

"I'd rather die fighting with my friends, than hiding here, waiting for a Death Eater to kill me and dad for not being pureblood!" I'd had it, and my mother knew it. "I'm going Mum. I have to." Then I did something neither of them expected, I pulled from memory the only thing I ever remembered the Sorting Hat saying besides my house name when I'd been sorted. "'Oh know the perils, read the signs, the warning history shows. For our Hogwarts is in danger, from external deadly foes. And we must unite inside her or we'll crumble from within.' I belong at Hogwarts, now." I turned to Dad. "Love you, both of you, but I have to, you know."

I moved to step past, and once more my mother's hand reached out to stop me, but this time, though shaking, it would not stop me. "Floo," my mother said softly. "It'll be faster." When I looked at her, surprised, she smiled. "I love Hogwarts too, dear."

So I went to our fireplace, and my parents held each other close and together they watched me go.

I scrambled into the Hog's Head and saw the bartender blinking at me. I opened my mouth to explain and he only shook his head, smiling sadly. "Regular way station tonight. Go there." He pointed me to the tunnel and I followed it, tumbling into the Room of Requirement.

"Happy thoughts. I knew you'd come." I would know Luna's voice anywhere and the smile she gave me was vacant as always, and yet, I'd never really noticed before, she wasn't quite vacant, you know? Just a little...loony. "Go to the Great Hall. They'll need you there."

There was a moment though, as I was running down the hall, that I saw Ginny Weasley standing and tlaking to Neville, they were debating something, sounded like Ginny had been ordered to go somewhere she didn't want to go. I caught her eye, not sure why, but I saw her grin and I gave her and Neville a slight salute with my wand.

Yes, I was there to fight.

I don't need to tall you how the battle went, you'll hear all about it, I'm sure. Though to be honest, I'd still take the Quibbler more seriously than the Prophet. I've never been more proud in my life to see Neville run at the Dark Lord, to hear him deny his only chance at life, and when he yelled 'Dumbledore's Army'...Well, if I hadn't been crying my yell would have been louder, but I'm sure I will never have been happier to yell away my life, because I knew at least that life was worth dying for.

So now, years later, I walk into Hogwarts to drop off my children for their first year. Why didn't I leave them at the platform? Well, to be honest it's too crowded. Everyone wants to send their children to Hogwarts, the school where Voldemort was finally and utterly destroyed, the school where many of the teachers are legends. There's another reason too, though, I want to see my home again, the place where I became an adult, where I learned what it means to be human, blood purity aside.

I see children filing in, and I see some familiar features. Red Hair and green eyes. Blonde hair with a slightly vacant expression. These are our children, the children we fought for.

This though, is the reason I came.

The courtyard. I remember it scattered with bodies, curses flying everywhere.

Now, though, someone took a few moments, and made a memorial. I see a statue in the middle, with two pedestals beside it.

On one plaque lay two pieces of paper, and on the pedestal is engraved simply 'D.A.' I know the two papers. One is that first list, of all the members of the original DA. And the seond is the second list, and my name is on it. I do not stop to look at it, I know those names very well.

The second pedestal has no paper, it has a flat top and on it's side it says simply 'HeadMasters.' There are only two names engraved on it, and I am glad to think that maybe the reason Snape didn't see me that day is not because he was a prat, but because he wasa hero after all.

The staue in the middle is my favorite. It represents much to me. There are two wizards, both young, both with their wands pointed at the sky. One has a camera strung round his neck, and other...well, there's a glint of red in the stone where his hair is carved. Beside them stands a house-elf, wand also at the ready. Behind the house-elf stands a couple, hands joined together as they give each other a loving look. I wonder how often their son looked at this statue of them. There is another man there, leaning on a cane, one of his eyes a little off-center, and no matter where you stand you feel it's watching you.

At the base of the statue, a simple inscription: "For those we remember."

The most important statue though, is the one sat out of the way, the one that does not stand out, it is in a corner, serenely looking over all who enter the courtyard. At the base of the statue another inscription. "Help will always be given at Hogwarts to those who ask for it."

It is a reminder, I think, and a warning. Never to forget.

Thanks to Scotty for the statue. Love ya!


End file.
